


Just Another Surge Protector

by thefrogg



Category: Sky High (2005)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-11
Updated: 2009-08-11
Packaged: 2017-10-10 17:40:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/102361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefrogg/pseuds/thefrogg
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: They don't mean to get so close, but it turns out they work pretty well as a duo.<br/>Kink: friendship and affection<br/>Author's Note: Set mid-sophomore year for Will (about January?), so Will's 16 and Warren's ~18 and a senior.<br/>Author's Other Note: Flashbacks are in italics.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Another Surge Protector

The ceiling was white. Well, okay, white, yes, but the curvature threw shadows.

"Why the he-ell--" Warren's voice caught, triggering a coughing fit.

"Warren!" Will sounded startled, worried. Happy. "You're awake!"

The bed was eased into a half-reclining position, and a glass, straw bent and poking over the rim, held within easy reach. Warren sucked greedily, the cool water soothing his parched throat. The glass was nearly empty before he had to stop for breath, letting his head thump heavily against the pillow. "Stronghold."

"Want more?"

He ignored the question. "Why am I in detention, and why--"

"Wait."

Warren glared.

"Do you remember anything?"

_"Please, no, not here! I told you not to call me here--" Someone pushed past curious and worried students, fighting her way through the lunchtime crowd.  
_  
"Melissa."

"Her parents are going through a nasty divorce." Will fidgeted uncomfortably, nails scratching against the glass he had yet to set down. "It got a lot nastier."

_She lost her balance, steadying herself on someone's shoulder. She stumbled back, staring in horror at a statue covered in rime._

"She lost control, and I--" Warren stopped when Will shook his head. "Then what? What else would you call it?"

"Power surge."

"You're kidding me." Melissa was already one of the more powerful heroes at Sky High. One of the strongest cryokinetics of this generation. For her to have had a power surge, a second, amplifying onset of the same power - it was mindboggling.

And terrifying.

_Students panicked, some trying to ask what was wrong, some fleeing, some using their own powers in an attempt to shield themselves and one another._

_Melissa just froze everything she touched, the affected radius growing wider and wider. Tears froze on her cheeks as her own skin turned blue._

Will bit his lip, shifting in his chair.

"What aren't you telling me?"

"You had one too," Will said very softly.

That, Warren remembered, in a hazy, vague sort of fashion.

_Fireballs wouldn't help; they wouldn't thaw, wouldn't contain, wouldn't do anything but frighten and exacerbate the situation._

_But he was still the only hero present with power that could counter Melissa's._

Warren turned away. "They think I'm like my father now." Bile crawled up his throat, burning; he gagged, forcing it back down.

Glass shattered, pieces raining to the floor. "No, no. Nobody thinks that, I promise."

Will was suddenly too close, hovering nervously at Warren's shoulder, one hand - wet and glittery with glass shards - reaching out toward him before falling away. "I don't remember what happened." He swallowed. "Not...not after."

_Warren could thaw, but it wouldn't be fast enough, he'd have to be too close..._

_He had line-of-sight._

"Nobody died, Warren, nobody was even seriously injured. Nothing more than mild hypothermia." Will's voice was too earnest. "You saved everyone there."

_He could feel the linoleum floor beneath his fingertips; a thin line of flames raced across the cafeteria, splitting a few feet away from Melissa to enclose her in a circle. The band of flames broadened, flaring up, heat rolling inward in a great wave._

_Melissa cried out, begging for him to help the others. Her phone struck the wall a moment later, a twisted piece of metal and melted plastic._

Warren couldn't believe...he'd burned Melissa alive, kept her in that cage of heat and fire even as he'd done the same to students she'd accidentally frozen, thawing them one by one before leaving them to be carted off to the infirmary. But he couldn't let Melissa go.

He could still hear her sobbing.

"I swear, you didn't hurt anyone. Melissa's in the hospital, but you didn't kill her."

Gentle fingers touched his cheek, his neck, brushing his hair aside. Warren couldn't supress a flinch, couldn't keep his teeth from snapping shut on a hiss.

"I thought you trusted me. It's been over a year, I thought you'd..." Dejected, Will backed into the chair, turning away. "I'll go, and get, get...I think Boomer's outside, waiting..."

"Stronghold."

"Warren?"

"Melissa's." He couldn't think it, much less say it. "Alive."

"Yeah, they had to put her in neutralizer cuffs, but she's okay. You kept her from freezing herself to death."

"Freeze...herself?" Warren rolled his head back and forth on the pillow, fingernails clawing at the IV boards beneath his hands.

"I told you, she had a power surge. She was up here for a while, until they figured out her powers didn't overcome the circuitry and short them out."

Warren didn't answer, just blinked up at the ceiling. If Melissa hadn't been able to override the neutralizer cuffs, then the only reason he was still here was...Yes, it took a split second for the cuffs to take over the function of the detention center, but very few superheroes (or supervillains) could take advantage of that.

Apparently he was one of the few.

"You were feeding off each other at the end," Will said softly. "The more she tried to control it, the worse it got, and the harder you had to fight to contain her. It didn't take long for you to get...mentally locked into a state where nothing else mattered, and no one could convince you it was okay to stop."

"Then how did I end up here?"

Will winced, ducking and rubbing the back of his head.

"Stronghold. Don't make me--" He rolled his eyes and cursed. "Damnit. Detention center."

That startled Will into laughing. "No, no, see, I don't quite know, either. I, uh. Well. I know they got Melissa under control first - Larry went in in his rock form and got cuffs on her - but you, uh."

"I what, Stronghold? There's a reason I've got IV's in both arms." Warren tried lifting them, but either they were way too heavy or he was weak as a kitten. And he was too afraid it was the latter to want to know.

"Um. You were--defending yourself. Like, you couldn't let anyone get close to you so you could keep Melissa under control, no matter what. So..."

Warren raised an eyebrow. "So?"

"Well, I got all the other students, the ones Melissa'd frozen and you'd thawed, out of the line of, heh, fire. And. Um, well, once Melissa'd been cuffed I went to try and talk you down. Except Medulla--"

"--used one of his rays on me, I get it, Stronghold," Warren finished when Will couldn't continue.

Will shook his head. "No, that's not it. He um. Tried. I kind of--went berserk?" His expression was one of chagrin and profound embarrassment.

"Save the Citizen, protect your partner, it's part of your training." And there were plenty of stories: stories of superheroes having to be talked down or, as a last resort, taken out by a friend, because they'd gone mad trying to protect an injured partner or sidekick. The public thought that the heroing instincts kicked into high gear when someone close became the victim; they never saw the weddings that almost invariably followed such things. Warren barely managed to crush the tiny glow of hope that sparked; Layla was just as helpless as the rest of the students.

Will could only shrug in answer. "I don't know what happened after Larry got Melissa out. They couldn't get to you without taking me down first. I think they might have had to call my dad, but nobody will give me a straight answer."

Okay, yeah, now that was a bit...telling. And explained the embarrassment. "Just how long have I been here, anyways?"

"It's Thursday evening, so, uh, two and a half days?"

"And you've been here the whole time?"

Will blinked at him. "Well, most of the time, yeah..."

"Didn't you have a date with the Hippie?"

Will choked, turning away before he got himself back under control. "Um. We...kind of broke up?"

"You broke up."

"Yeah. After the spring dance."

"After the spring dance. Which was ten months ago." If Will hadn't been trying to protect Layla, then...

"Yeah."

"And you didn't tell me." Warren felt the fires heat his blood again, but there was no familiar flicker of light, no soothing heat on his fingertips.

"I thought you knew."

Warren only raised an eyebrow, giving Will the same empty glare he'd gotten that first day in the cafeteria.

Will took a deep breath. "Warren, I'm gay."

"And?"

"And. Well. We've sort of...I get someone to listen to me..." and he mumbled something that Warren couldn't decipher. "...and she gets to call me an idiot for not saying anything." Will looked quietly miserable, eyes dull, shoulders slumped, wearing the shadow of a frown.

It was an expression Warren sensed the other members of their team had a great deal of experience with, but he'd never seen it before now. "Stronghold." This time he let the little glow of hope grow to a beacon.

"Warren?" Will's eyes had brightened, shoulders straightening.

"You trying to tell me something?"

"Um. Maybe?"

Warren tilted his head back and stared at the ceiling, laughter rumbling low in his throat. "You're an idiot."

Will's swallow was audible in the silence.

"Being frozen solid is one of the few powers you **aren't **immune to."


End file.
